Early Years Induction – Questions for Parents
Finding out key information from parents/carers in the induction process can provide you with great foundations for gathering the knowledge you need to make sound baseline judgements. As a child’s main carer, their opinions and observations are important and if you ask the right questions you can gather relevant and useful information to help you begin to from a picture about each child and also provide the right environment to help move their learning forward.
We have put together a few questions that you can use either through conversations with parents/carers or if you prefer a more formal approach they can be put into a questionnaire. Pick and choose the ones you prefer and also add your own.
Characteristics of Effective Learning
- How inquisitive are they?
- How far will they take a risk?
- Do they pretend when they are playing? Please give a couple of examples
- How easily distracted are they?
- Will they keep trying if they don’t succeed straight away or do they tend to give up?
- How good are they at solving a problem? Please give an example if you can.
Personal Social & Emotional Development
- How do they respond to new people and new situations?
- How are they when you leave them?
- How do they tell you how they are feeling?
- Do they usually play on their own or do they prefer to play with others?
- Do they chat during their play and what sort of things do they say?
- How are they getting on with learning to share and take turns?
- How do they respond to rules or boundaries?
- What do they usually choose to play with?
- Can they choose what to play with independently or do they need your help?
Communication & Language
- Do they join in with any rhymes or songs – which ones?
- What is their favourite story/rhyme?
- Please give an example of instructions they can follow e.g. “Get your coat.”
- Which, if any, of these question words can they answer ‘who’, ‘what’ or ‘where?’ Please give an example if you can.
- How many words do they usually use to communicate? (single words, a few words, sentences) Please give an example if you can.
Physical Development
- What does your child typically do at the park?
- What do they do in a large open space?
- What do they do on play equipment?
- What do they do with a ball?
- What sort of marks do they make with drawing and writing tools?
Independence skills
- What do they use to feed themselves and to have a drink?
- Which clothes can they put on or take off?
- How independent are they in toileting?
